Caterpillar Inc. of Peoria, Ill., manufactures off-road mining mobile machines. For example, the Caterpillar 777C is an off-road mining truck. In commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,390,125, Kyrtsos et al disclose an autonomous mobile machine system for use with a mining mobile machine such as a 777C truck. Such an autonomous mobile machine system may be used, for example, to implement an autonomous mining operation. For example, a plurality of autonomous dump trucks can haul rock from an excavation site to a crusher site in an open pit mining operation.
In addition, in commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,586,030, Kemner et al disclose a system using a queuing technique to manage a single input, fixed position resource such as a wheel loader. In Kemner's system, a fleet of mobile machines access the fixed resource as part of a scheduled routine, being controlled by the queuing technique in an orderly fashion.
However, the mobile machines require routine service and both scheduled and unscheduled maintenance at irregular times. It is often not feasible or efficient for a mobile machine to approach a service area as it initially senses the need for service. A more complex queue control system is needed to bring mobile machines in for service and maintenance in a manner that keeps the overall work site operating smoothly and efficiently.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the problems as set forth above.